Below is a summary of the notable FOIA court decisions and news from last month, as well as a look ahead to FOIA events in September.
We posted and summarized 28 opinions in August. Highlights include two reversals by neighboring appellate courts. In State of Georgia v. Dep’t of Justice (D.C. Cir. Aug. 12, 2025), the D.C. Circuit held that agency communications with outside parties can still fall within Exemption 5 when they consist of attorney work product shared under a common-interest agreement that requires confidentiality. The court explained that while the “consultant corollary” cases help show why “intra-agency” should be read broadly, they do not control in this different setting. It further held that, except for two early emails sent before the common-interest agreement was finalized, the records were properly protected as attorney work product and DOJ had not waived that protection.
Two days later, the Fourth Circuit reversed a district court’s decision that plaintiff had not constructively exhausted its administrative remedies, that the agency’s partial litigation production mooted the claims, and that and separate administrative appeal was required to challenge withheld records. See Louise Trauma Ctr. v. USCIS (4th Cir, Aug. 14, 2025). The appellate decision was largely expected, as the district court ignored well-settled principles on all scores.
Top news
On August 14, 2025, the Department of Energy issued a notice in the Federal Register requiring requesters who submitted FOIA requests before October 1, 2024 to confirm their interest—as well as the control number assigned to the request—by September 15, 2025, or face administrative closure. DOE cited a tripling of FOIA requests over four years (from 1,300 to over 4,000 annually) and blamed “vexatious requesters and automated bots” for clogging the system.
On August 22, 2025, DOJ’s Office of Information Policy issued guidance on backlog reduction plans. Three days later, OIP announced new training dates for fiscal year 2026.
Sept. calendar
Sept. 11: Federal FOIA Advisory Committee meeting.
Sept. 16-18: Graduate School USA, Freedom of Information and Privacy Acts Course.
Sept. 22-24: Management Concepts, The Privacy Act and The Freedom of Information Act Training.
Sept. 30: Last day of fiscal year 2025